landscape preservation

It got me thinking about my favorite vernacular architecture in the USA – our barns. As small farmers become scarcer and scarcer, these beautiful structures that dot the rural landscape are falling into ruin as well. If you are interested in helping to preserve America’s barns, check out The National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Barn Again! effort.

As many of you know, The Farnsworth House has suffered great damage from the latest round of flooding in September 2008. The house was built in a floodplain, but Mies thought the water would only reach the floor in the most severe of circumstances. Apparently, he was wrong. The Farnsworth House site asks for flood mitigation ideas, but they also include a “heard it” list, which had me in stitches. I just had to share it with you:

Before you get started though…

We have, over the course of our five years managing this property, continually investigated solutions to the threat posed by the river. To that end, we begin this discussion with a list of previously proposed ideas:

1. Placement of a pontoons under the building
2. Longer column extensions that slide out of their footings
3. Szikorsky Helicopter to lift the 300 ton house
4. Hydraulic jacks to raise it in place
5. Building up the site flood plain by 12 ft.
6. Move the house to high ground
7. Retractable flood walls surrounding the house.
8. Waterproofing everything inside the house (vinyl upholstery, plastic laminate wood?)
9. Inflatable raft under the house
10. Internal sandbags around furniture and core
11. Dikes and dams
12. Moats
13. Fixed Moment Frame below the soil
14. Sandbags
15. Temporary flood walls
16. Reverse aquarium designed to rise out of the ground
17. Giant Zip lock bag
18. Steel waterproof shutters

When considering these ideas we evaluate them against the following criteria:
• Cost
• Sensitivity to Preservation Initiatives
• Practicality

These are the same criteria the experts will use in considering your ideas.

The problem for me in finding a solution is that the house is so connected to the site. Moving it changes everything; the planned vistas, the way it relates to the topography, the idea of the floating house in the floodplain. Then again, I’m trained as a landscape architect so I am very biased towards the relationship of built work to site. If you have any bright ideas that do not involve a Sikorsky helicopter or the world’s largest Zip-Lock bag (hey Zip-Lock, have I got a marketing idea for you…), click here to submit it. For some reason, “Rollin’ on a River” is going through my head and I’m picturing some sort of Transformer action happening with the house and a tall stacks riverboat…and now casinos are now entering my mind. Not good.

All photos from farnsworthhouse.org. The photos on that site are stunning, go check out the gallery if you need some inspiration today.

Something about this article by Christopher Maag made me smile. I had no idea that the Erie Canal was still in use. I love that our old system of canals is being used again. Well, not the system, most of them are no longer navigable, but apparently, the Erie Canal still is, and it is regaining popularity in these days of high fuel prices. Once a route that made New York City the major port it is today, it was replaced by railroads which were later largely replaced by trucking years later. Now the canal seems like it’s ready to make a major comeback:

The canal still remains the most fuel-efficient way to ship goods between the East Coast and the upper Midwest. One gallon of diesel pulls one ton of cargo 59 miles by truck, 202 miles by train and 514 miles by canal barge, Ms. Mantello* said. A single barge can carry 3,000 tons, enough to replace 100 trucks.

I don’t know why this is so appealing to me. Maybe it’s my awe at the manpower, engineering and hyper-ambitious vision that made the canals possible back in 1825. Maybe it was working on a site in Valley Forge that had only remnants and hints of the canal, towpath and lovely crumbling old walls left. Maybe I’ve always wanted to take a really slow ride on a barge, or that tugboats are cute. Perhaps it was checking off “Modern Transit” as one of the tags for this post and grinning! Whatever it is, I love it!

*Carmella R. Mantello is director of the New York State Canal Corporation, a subsidiary of the New York State Thruway Authority that operates the Erie and three other canals.

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